


Nightmares

by RebelDrFerguson



Category: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
Genre: Nightmares, Poetic one shot, Swearing, father-son bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-26 16:49:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12063111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RebelDrFerguson/pseuds/RebelDrFerguson
Summary: Bruce is dreaming and wakes up screaming. Slightly poetic one-shot.





	Nightmares

**Author's Note:**

> I've watched this movie too many times...Bruce doesn't realize what he's got. I had to rectify that.

Bruce knew he should have known better.

 

He kept him away from the front line for this reason.

 

He told Alfred not long after he turned 32 that he was to stay at the manor no matter the situation. Bruce was determined to protect his Butler not just his city. 

 

Alfred had spent years holding him safe, playing the shield against the world that turned an innocent boy so cold. But as he grew, as he got old he realised Alfred would die on him if this continued. 

 

From bruises to stab wounds, from gashes to broken limbs, Alfred fought Assassin's off by in the manor when he just a teen. 

 

Took bullets to let Bruce run to safety. 

 

Every scar Bruce recalled Alfred had in his patchwork of war wounds made him feel just that bit more guilty for the life he chose. 

 

But he could never forgive the city that took his life. That took his parents, that took his sons. 

 

He fought in rage just to remind himself he was still alive. Drunk himself to sleep just to wash away the screams.

 

As he stared on through the haze, he could hear Diana shouting for him. 

 

He felt Clark land behind him, more alive than before he died…

 

He saw the wreckage, he’d heard the bomb. He’d been the one telling Alfred to run. 

 

Two cars lay on their side, a truck split in two lay in the road. Fires ranged around as people shouted for help.

 

Bruce listened to the glass crunch under his boots as he walked towards Alfred in dread. 

 

The Butler lay unconscious in the road. His glass just feet away, broken. 

 

The only father figure he’d ever truly known lay bleeding out on the scorched concrete surrounded by the smashed control panel he’d been repairing for their raid. 

 

But that’s when something flew out of the dark. Something massive, something black, something worse than the previous nightmares he’d had. 

 

It smashed into the truck, sent it flying down the road, spun and knocked the other cars into the Batmobile, where Alfred sat trying to finish the wiring. 

 

He recalled hearing himself scream for the man to run, saw him step from the car with a face of stone like he knew he was doomed. 

 

They watched as the truck fly over ahead and crash mere feet away blasting the car and Alfred back in the resulting explosion of the petrol tank. 

  
  


Now he stood above the body. 

 

Yanking off his cowl he felt the hot tears streaming down his face. He’d fuck up again and this time he’d paid the ultimate price for not listening. 

 

Alfred had said it was dangerous.

Diana said it was suicide.

Clark had told him he’d gone insane. 

 

But he’d not listened to one of them. Because he was Batman. When did he he start thinking he was invincible?

 

Wasn’t he suppose to protect not harm? Wasn’t that his principle? 

 

Falling to his knees he reached out a gloved hand to Alfred’s blood soaked coat and cried. 

 

“This is suicide!” he’d snapped in the hall a few days before. 

 

Not he lay here without a word. 

 

Bruce felt the Kryptonian land beside him touch his shoulder like it could bring everyone back he’d ever lost. But he couldn’t take his eyes off Alfred’s body. 

 

Suddenly he was a kid again. Sat in dark alleyway crying and covered blood, but this time his parent’s weren't the ones he’d lost, Alfred was. 

 

He’d lost the greatest thing he’d ever had. He’d lost a best friend, his hope, a dad.

 

He was choking on air, Diana somewhere in the back yelling for a medic as more smoke filling his vision. 

He shook the body. Nothing. 

 

He tried again even though it was in vain. 

 

He was coughing, choking from the pain in his chest.

 

He felt guilty from beating the man around the bush till he got sick of his games, it was never fair because Alfred cared and Bruce just transferred all his blame, all his pain. 

Their relationship had been tricky since the beginning, Bruce holding Alfred out in limbo while he reminded indecisive about everything that he’d been given, all the money and the name, the weight he believed he’d had to carry alone all this way. 

 

But he’d never been, but only he could see, that after all these years, he’d never been alone, not a for a fucking second of his life, not since he was born. 

 

“Alfred?”

 

Finally, he could bloody talk. He felt like he beginning ripped in two.

 

“Alfred?!”

 

Why was he here, why was he dead? Why the hell had he listened to Bruce when Bruce could even listen to himself! 

  
  


**“ALFRED!!!!”**

  
  


* * *

 

 

It wasn't too late. Barely 1am. 

 

But Alfred just couldn’t sleep. Bruce had come back from that funeral in the darkest mood he’d ever seen. He’d not looked that depressed even as a teen. 

 

The Butler knew a little part of him should be glad that Bruce had learnt a lesson, but it hurt him to know that as much as Bruce was hurting, he couldn't help him. 

 

The last time he’d cried he was nineteen, screaming from a dream about a giant bat and hands clutched to his shirt as the tears made it wetter. 

 

Alfred had always wished he could make everything better. 

 

As he sat on the sofa, a glass of scotch in his hand he heard a pitter pat on the window panes. 

 

Just the rain. Guess it fit the mood. 

 

The world ached in loss and he didn’t know just what he could do. 

 

When he heard Bruce muttering his name from the bedroom, he set the glass aside, sitting up confused. 

 

When it fell quiet and he went to pick it back up but the scream caused him to knock it straight off the table top. 

 

He jumped up faster than he ever thought he could and dashed madly down the hall.

 

* * *

  
  
  


He sat up patting, his face wet with tears, choking on his breath and looking about for the scene. 

 

But found himself sat in bed again. 

 

It just made him cry harder.

 

When the hallway light flooded the Dark Knight’s room, part of him hoped to see his father.

 

But he wasn’t seven years old. He wasn’t asleep in the manor. 

 

He was forty-two and in a house built over the lake. His parents were long gone, just ghosted memories and he had nothing to go on. 

 

But when the figure moved across from the door he found a reason to remember why he wasn’t alone anymore. 

 

“Bruce?”

 

The worried and deep monotone of his Butler filled the hollows of his heart and looked up to see the face of the only real father he’d had. 

 

The Butler’s hands felt rough on his cheeks as he wiped away the tears that ran down his face. 

 

“Nightmare?”

Bruce could only nod. He didn’t know whether he was still dreaming. Was he about to wake up and find Alfred still dead...still bleeding…

 

But as strong arms pulled him hard into to a hug, he found a smile to the rough tweed waistcoat he’d grown accustomed too. 

 

He was real. He was alive and he wasn’t lying in a road.

 

Minutes passed as Bruce cried silently into Alfred’s coat, trying to get the courage to ask the question that threatens to break his lungs, feeling stupid for getting to this state at forty-two. 

 

“Don’t leave me” he eventually croaked hugging the man tighter. 

 

He felt Alfred’s breath hitch as he stepped back and leant down, hands framing Bruce’s face solidly, the tears in his own eyes proved he’d felt something rip too. 

 

“Don’t leave me” he begged again panicking as he recalled Clark Kent’s death. 

 

Alfred just shook his head and wiped away another tear.

  
  


“Never” 

  
  


No matter whether the world would hate or his peers could pressure...

Alfred would always be there to make him be better. 


End file.
